And through the convalescing days Cameron had his place, like a fixed star.

Often worn by the day’s silent remorse and earnest promise as to the future, Joan looked to that hour when Cameron, calm, serious but cheerful, sat by her bedside—­a strong link between the folly of the past and the hope of the times on ahead.

Vaguely she recalled the blurred weeks of fever and pain, and always his quiet voice and cool touch held part.

“And to think,” Joan could but smile, “that he does not know me—­but I know who he is just as I knew about——­” She could not name Raymond yet—­she could only think kindly of him when she held to the days before that last, tragic night.

And Cameron, meanwhile, was drawing wrong conclusions.  Not that they changed his personal attitude toward the girl whose life he had helped save.  To him she was a human creature whose faith in her future must be restored as her body was in the process of being.  Cameron believed in stepping-stones and was utterly opposed to waste of any kind.

“She’s paid her debt and his, too, I wager,” Cameron often muttered; “that’s the devil of it all, and she’ll go on and perhaps down—­if she doesn’t get a start up.  If I could only get hold of her folks—­it would help!”

But Joan held him at bay when he ventured on that line.

“When I am quite well,” she said with gentle dignity, “I am going home and do my own explaining.”

“Are you considering—­them?” Cameron frowned at her.

“I am—­as I never have before!”

To this silence was the only reply.

Presently Joan made her first big stride toward complete recovery.  She forsook her bed during the day and, in pink gown and dainty cap—­procured by Miss Brown—­she passed from a “case” to an individual.

The twilight hour now became something of a function and Cameron dropped his professional manner with his outdoor trappings and appeared, often, as a tired but very humanly interesting young man.

He talked of safe, ordinary things, he brought books and flowers, and while Miss Brown kept a rigid appearance, she inwardly sniffed—­or the equivalent.

And then came the Sunday before Joan was to leave the hospital.  It happened to be Easter, and a woman was singing in the little chapel down the hall.  The room doors were open and the sweet words and melody floated in to the silent listeners—­Joan pictured them as she sat and felt her tears roll down her cheeks.

“Some—­are going out!” she thought, “and others, like me, must go on.  And here we all are with walls between, but our doors open to: 

    “He weaves the shining garments
      Unceasingly and still
    Along the quiet waters
      In niches of the hills.”

The words seemed to paint, in the narrow room, the dim Gap.  The sound of the river was in Joan’s ears and she knew that the niches of the safe hills where her loved ones waited, were full of the spring blossoms.